


Chickadee

by Living_Underground



Category: The X-Files
Genre: Episode: s05e20 The End (X-Files), F/M, Lots of Angst, Missing Scene, an extension of the scene where Scully asks the gunmen about Diana, as Byers comforts her, because Mulder's off being an idiot with Diana
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-14
Updated: 2020-11-14
Packaged: 2021-03-09 20:41:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,480
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27552502
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Living_Underground/pseuds/Living_Underground
Summary: An extension of the scene in which Scully asks the Gunmen about Diana, followed by Byers comforting Scully about Diana.
Relationships: Diana Fowley/Fox Mulder, Fox Mulder/Dana Scully, John Byers & Dana Scully
Comments: 2
Kudos: 46





	Chickadee

**Author's Note:**

> Yo, it me! I don't know where this came from. I started writing it an hour ago because I couldn't sleep and ended up smashing it out. It does mean it's not proofread though so any mistakes are from sleep deprivation.
> 
> In other writing news, I have been writing a lot lately and then not liking anything I've written, or just adding more and more little bits and not connecting anything. Essentially, I just can't finish anything at the moment, so I am jumping between 90000 different WIPs. ADHD mood right there. But I have been working on the last chapter of All Her Ducks a lot lately, so that might be up soon. And I have a little something I'm writing for Christmas because we all need some holiday cheer this year.

‘So, his ‘chickadee’, huh?’

‘Yeah,’ Langley nodded, ‘they were married and everything.’

‘Married?’ she huffed out on a breath, licked her lips and nodded once, ‘Right. Uh, I’m just gonna – you guys carry on with this, I’m just gonna go to the bathroom, sorry, excuse me.’

The three men watched her hurry away before Langley smacked Frohike upside the head, ‘ _Chickadee?’_

_‘Married?!’_ Byers hissed, punching Langley in the shoulder, ‘what the heck were you two thinking?’

‘She deserves the truth.’

‘Yeah, but if Mulder didn’t tell her, he probably had his reasons.’

Frohike shrugged, ‘she asked, what else were we to say?’

‘Maybe not _chickadee_? We should just have said they worked together, early on.’

‘No, I don’t agree with that.’

‘Langley-‘

‘No, it’s better off for her in the long run.’

‘But not right now. We should have let Mulder tell her when he thought it was the right time.’

Langley scoffed, ‘since when have you been such a suppresser of the truth?’

‘I’m not- that’s not what I’m doing, that’s not what I’m saying, but Mulder’s gonna kill us when he finds out, and I know I’m not telling him it was me who told her,’ Byers sighed and shook his head. ‘I’m going to go check on her.’

He could hear the running of the tap, a weak attempt to mask the sound of retching, and he knocked on the door, cringing at the uncomfortable loudness of it.

‘I’ll be out in a second,’ her voice was hoarse and weak, quavering somewhat.

‘It’s me, Agent Scully. Byers. I just wanted to check you were okay.’

She was quiet for a moment before the sound of the toilet flushing and her washing her hands, followed by the snick of the lock. The door didn’t open though, so he pushed down on the handle, poking his head inside. She was stood at the sink, knuckles white as she clutched onto the chipped porcelain, jaw set as she glared at her tear-stained face in the cracked mirror. He shut the door behind him and folded his hands together, looking down stoically at his shined shoes.

‘Are you-‘

‘Bad shellfish. I’m fine,’ she didn’t meet his gaze, her face dropping instead to watch the channels of water trickle down the drain. Her chin crumpled and her lip curled into a grimace, ‘he never told me. He’s married and he never even told me. I thought-‘ she looked up to the mottled ceiling, shook her head and gave a soft, self-deprecating scoff before turning to stare straight at him, ignoring the tears running down her cheeks, ‘I really thought I meant something to him. I thought- I thought he- I thought I was important to him, and all this time, I-‘ she released the sob that had been building, and once the floodgates were opened the tears all came rushing out, her shoulders shaking uncontrollably and her breaths coming in short, sharp gasps.

Byers took the two small steps to close the space between them and wrapped his arms around her tentatively. To say his experience of comforting crying women was minimal would probably be rather an exaggeration, though he was fairly confident that of his two friends, he was probably the best for the job.

‘You know, just thinking about them together and I just, it makes me feel so, so sick to think that he never felt the same way about me that I felt about him, and it’s not fair, it’s really not fair and now I think about it I realise that we’ve come so close so many times these past few years and every time he’s pushed me away and I guess- I guess I was just imagining it, this thing between us and I feel so awful, what must he think of me? I mean, God, I’m so humiliated, Byers! You know, back when we had that team-building seminar we never actually got to in the end? I actually thought that something would happen between us. I thought, ‘I’m alive, I’m in remission, we’ve been getting so much closer over the last year and I like him, I really like him, so what’s stopping us, and if it doesn’t work out I can just say it was the high of being alive still or blame all the free wine at the wine and cheese thing’ and when we didn’t get there, when he decided to help out that local case I took him minibar wine and I flirted and he ran, he literally ran into the forest. I mean, it’s so obvious now and I’m such an idiot!’ she brought a hand up to cover her eyes, her other clutching at her chest as she tried to drag in ragged breaths. ‘I…I love him and I thought he loved me too!’

‘Agent Scully…’ Byers sighed, rubbing her arms in what he hoped was a comforting way, ‘he and Diana, they haven’t been…they divorced, back when she left, a whole year before you even joined the X-files. It wasn’t- I wouldn’t have considered it a healthy relationship, looking back. He doesn’t even talk about her to us, and we were there for it. I know it can’t feel good to be learning this all like this, but I don’t think it changes the way he feels about you.’

‘He thinks of me as a friend, that’s all.’

‘It’s not all, Dana, and you know it.’

‘What, he does want to sleep with me?’ she scoffed, pulled away from him, her voice and face souring, ‘I’m sure he just wants another notch on his bedpost, another partner he can claim to have shown the stars to?’

‘You know that’s not how he feels?’

‘Do I?’

‘Yes. Firstly, you and I both know he doesn’t have a bedpost,’ she almost cracks a smile at that, sniffing away her tears, slouching back against the wall after her outburst. ‘And you know that Mulder would never boast about such things, especially not about you. He respects you too much. And, if he did want to sleep with you, which is not my place to say whether he does or doesn’t, he wouldn’t exactly be forthcoming about it. I don’t know how much time you spent with Diana-?’

‘Enough.’

‘Then you’ll have seen how manipulative she can be. She builds him up and then puts him down.’

‘He seems to have a penchant for manipulative women,’ she rolled her eyes and Byers frowned at her in question. ‘I met Phoebe once, an old flame from Oxford. She dragged him along for quite a ride.’

‘Well, he’s not got the greatest history with valuing his own self-worth. I guess people putting him down reminds him somewhat of his childhood-’

‘Save the pop-psychology for Mulder.’

He smiled softly and nodded, ‘all I’m saying is that you shouldn’t really be that surprised that he didn’t tell you. It was over years ago, and she hurt him a lot, both throughout their relationship and when she left. And as for his feelings, well, just give him a bit of time.’

‘I know,’ she nodded, sniffing, ‘I just…I feel betrayed that I had to find out from you guys, that he didn’t say anything when I met her, that _she_ didn’t say anything, you know? I mean, I asked how they knew each other and from what they said you’d think they just worked together on a couple of cases, but…’

‘Agent Scully, does Mulder know everything about your life before you met him? Does he know all about your past relationships?’

‘He knows…enough. He knows I was never married.’

‘But there are still things he doesn’t know, some pretty big ones I imagine. And one day you might tell him or you might not but that is your decision, and this was his, okay? He’s not hiding it from you because he doesn’t trust you, or because he doesn’t want you to know, he just doesn’t want to think about it, doesn’t want to remember his pain. Just give him some time. Get this case over and done with and then talk to him, okay? Tell him how you feel. Maybe even tell him some of your secrets and make it even. Just don’t feel bad about this, okay? It’s over between them, and I don’t think it’s starting up again any time soon. Besides,’ he bowed subtly towards her, lowing his tone to a conspiratorial whisper, ‘you’re ten times more beautiful than Diana ever was.’

‘Thank you, Byers,’ she sniffed and nodded with a quiet smile.

‘No problem. I’m going to get back to the others, okay. I’ll give you a moment,’ and with that he backed out of the bathroom with a smile, hoping that he had made somewhat of a difference to how his idiot friend's partner was feeling.

**Author's Note:**

> I kind of like the idea of this conversation buoying Scully's spirits a bit until she walks past them holding hands, and then this conversation just makes everything kind of ten times worse.


End file.
